Price Of Oil

Normally product pricing doesn't affect my budget too much. I don't really buy that much in mass quantities, except for beer, of course. When 30 packs of Milwaukee's Best went up $1 I complained but hey, it's still pretty cheap at $13.50.

The recent increase at the pump hasn't hurt me too much. I only drive 36 miles a week and even at 16 mpg I don't use that much. I should be griping about my home heating oil that went from $300 five years ago to $550 this year, but I took that hit without thinking about it too much. I did go online to compare the rates of different providers but they were all about the same price that I paid.

Today I went to buy oil for the Jeep. I've always bought Valvoline. It used to be $2.50 a quart. Last fall it was $4 and I ended up getting the O'Reilly brand because that was much, much cheaper. Now Valvoline is $6 and the O'Reilly oil is $3.50. Six quarts and a filter ended up costing me $25. You used to be able to take your car in for an oil change for less than $20 and not have to crawl underneath your car.

I've always changed the oil in my cars myself and will continue to do so. Again, since I don't put that many miles on, I think the cheap oil should be fine.

The guy at O'Reilly looked at me like I was crazy when I told him I only put on 2,000 miles a year and change my oil twice a year but if $25 keeps my car going strong I'll stick with it.